#i'm a lil frazzled atm and i know i write these things a lot when i'm frazzled but im a college student if im not frazzled then something

[pennypolendinaprotectionsquad]

Lemme talk about this volume as a whole, under the cut because, y’know, spoilers.

Under a readmore; mobile users, if you don’t like spoilers, scroll like your lives depend on it!

Honestly I feel like the best, strongest part of this volume was the development / reveal of Lie Ren and Nora’s pasts--also Blake’s parents.

I personally don’t like Yang’s “development”, and just... It felt like she overcame her obstacle way too fast. That’s just my opinion; you can say “it was off-screen she probably coped and Taiyang talked to her about it a lot” but no, that’s not how this sort of thing needs to go imo!

You need to example it! This sort of thing needs to be shown. It shouldn’t be “implied”. It’s important for it to be shown. One talk with Taiyang about how “normal is just what you make of it” isn’t the most... Y’know, helping thing.

And we can also say: “Yang’s just repressing it!”, well, RW///BY has never been the best at showing the internal workings / thoughts of a character; we’ve had a few moments like that (i.e. Ruby in The Emerald Forest, thinking about a partner--Weiss, thinking about how she’ll gain popularity with Pyrrha by her side, Yang’s nightmare, Ruby’s “dream”, Ren’s flashback when he was under the house with Nora, etc.) and this is, obviously imo something that needs to change a lil bit if they’re gonna have characters “repressing” big things like that. If they don’t wanna give us full-on thoughts, they need to give us subtle hints or something about what’s going on.

Ruby crying while writing her letter was just me, screaming: “Thank god, they let this child cry. For fuck’s sake, finally.”

Story-wise, it all mostly felt like filler, which is a super shame! Like, yes, we got more characters introduced, but for how long were they there? Did they contribute much? We know Weiss has Klein and Whitley, we know that Blake has parents, and they gave some good insight on Blake’s character and in my opinion, a little bit of development--y’know, we got to see her open up a little bit.

I also felt like Qrow was running the show when it came to plot, but he was a little more vague.

Things with Oscar sort of helped nudge a few plot-theories along, which is great, but again, as a whole, this volume felt mostly like filler towards “Current Events” in RW///BY. We got backstory, but.

This bringing in new characters and then “they’re gone” is also sort of... Tiresome to me, too. I’m hoping that we see more of Klein and Whitley in v5, even though Weiss obviously won’t be present with them.

Here’s hoping for more Tyrian, Hazel, and Arthur next volume, too. Obviously, Hazel and Arthur are coming up, but. Obviously Ghira and Kali will come up, too.

A scene that I really liked that I didn’t mention through any of this would have to be--y’know when Cinder’s training, and Emerald’s signaled to make an illusion of Ruby Rose fallen before them, so Cinder can blast her?

That was great; given by the time it took Emerald to stabilize the illusion, Emerald had probably done that a few times before this.

Another scene was, well, when Tyrian was getting ready to strike down on Ruby, Qrow racing in to save her; then that little “Hey. / “Hey...” Great, great scene, loved it.

RW///BY seems to have a habit of “raising more questions than it answers”, but honestly, I feel like this volume was the worst offender of that.

The music was, as always, wonderful, though.

Anyways, aside from this, personal favorite volumes:

1) V3; it had a lot of great action, and it drove things forward quite a bit; it changed the tone suddenly, and just got Heavy Real Fast. Not to mention Velvet’s weapon, holy shit!

2) V2; I liked the whole “Breach” thing goin’ on. That was wonderful. Not to mention Neopolitan. And the Penny “reveal”! That whole scene! !!!!

3) V1; c’mon, it’s the first volume. The trailers got me intrigued but this? This got me hooked. All because Ruby was so precious and adorable.

4) V4; sadly I just feel like this one was mediocre and just kinda... Eh. As much as I loved Tyrian, screaming “You bitch!”, and as much as I loved the Ren and Nora backstory, and Oscar himself, I just have to say that it really wasn’t a favorite.

TLDR; this volume felt like filler; not only that, but following the Old Habits, it raises even more questions than it answered. I personally wasn’t a fan of how they handled Yang’s development / overcoming her obstacles. The highlights, imo, Oscar, the Ren / Nora backstory, and Qrow.